The three men were never far from his side ever since Inevera had arranged marriages between them and Jardir’s sisters. Imisandre, Hoshvah, and Hanya had been in rags when Jardir left Sharik Hora three years ago, but now they were Jiwah Ka to his most trusted lieutenants, and had borne nephews and nieces to strengthen those loyalties.
“Our orders?” Shanjat asked.
“Tenth layer,” Jardir said.
Hasik spat in the dust. “The Sharum Ka insults you!”
“Calm yourself, Hasik,” Jardir said softly, and the big warrior immediately quieted. “Embrace the insult and it will pass through you, allowing you to see Everam’s path.”
Hasik nodded, falling in behind Jardir as he strode away from the palace. Hasik had returned from the dama’ting pavilion a changed man three years ago. He was still one of the Kaji’s fiercest warriors, but like a wolf brought to heel, he had given his loyalty fully to Jardir—the only way to preserve his honor after the humiliating defeat.
“The Sharum Ka fears you,” Ashan advised. “As he should. If you continue to gather all the glory, the Andrah may tire of having a weak old man commanding his forces and allow you to challenge him to single combat.”
“And seconds after he shouts ‘begin,’ we will have a new First Warrior,” Shanjat said.
“That isn’t going to happen,” Jardir said. “The Andrah and Sharum Ka are friends from of old. The Andrah will not betray his loyal servant even if the Damaji themselves demand it.”
“So what do we do?” Hasik asked.
“You go home to my sister and thank her for the meal she has no doubt prepared you,” Jardir said. “And when night falls, we go to the tenth layer and pray that Everam sends us alagai to show the sun.”
As always, Inevera was waiting for him when he reached his quarters in the Kaji palace. Her robe was lowered to uncover the breast where his daughter Anjha suckled. Jardir’s sons, Jayan and Asome, clung to her robes, young and strong.
Jardir knelt and spread his arms, and the boys fell into them, laughing as he lifted them high. He set them back down, and they ran back to their mother. The sight of his sons pricked at his serenity for a moment before he could embrace the feeling. It wasn’t just his reputation the Sharum Ka sullied. It was theirs, as well.
“Something troubles you, my husband?” Inevera asked.
“It is nothing,” Jardir said, but Inevera clicked her tongue at him.
“I am your Jiwah Ka,” she said. “You need not embrace your feelings with me.”
Jardir looked at her and let the tight lashes of his control ease.
“The Sharum Ka sends me to the tenth layer tonight,” he spat. “How many warriors will he lose while his best unit guards an empty layer?”
“It is a good sign, husband,” Inevera said. “It means the Sharum Ka fears you and your ambitions.”
“What good is that,” Jardir said, “if he robs me of every future glory?”
“He cannot be allowed to do that,” Inevera agreed. “You must find glory in the Maze now more than ever. The bones tell me the First Warrior is not long for this world. Your glory must outshine all others when he goes to Everam, if you are to take his place.”
“How am I to do that waving my spear at empty air?” Jardir growled.
Inevera shrugged. “Sharak is yours. You must find a way.”
Jardir grunted, nodding. She was right, of course. There were some things even a dama’ting could not advise upon.
“The sun will not set for hours,” Inevera advised. “A bout of lovemaking and a short sleep will clear your head.”
Jardir smiled and went to her. “I will call my mother to take the children.”
But Inevera shook her head, stepping away from his reaching arms. “Not me. The bones say Everalia is ripe. If you take her from behind with great force, she will bear you a strong son.”
Jardir scowled. Everalia was his third wife. Inevera hadn’t even bothered to show her to him before they were betrothed, saying the Jiwah Sen was selected for her breeder’s hips and the fortune the alagai hora cast, not her beauty.
“Always the bones!” Jardir snapped. “For once I would bed the wife I choose!”
Inevera shrugged. “Take Thalaja if you prefer,” she said, referring to his more beautiful second wife. “She is ripe as well. I simply thought you would prefer a son to another daughter.”
Jardir gritted his teeth. She was the one he wanted, but as Khevat had warned, wife or no, Inevera was dama’ting, and he could not simply take her the way he would another woman. He opened his mouth, and then closed it again.
Did she really cast the bones for everything? Sometimes it seemed Inevera just used claims of their foretellings to get him to act as she wished, but she had not been wrong yet, and it was true he needed more sons if he was to restore the line of Jardir to its former glory. Did it really matter which wife he took? Everalia was comely enough from behind.
He headed for the bedchamber, pulling off his robes.
They waited.
As cries of battle rang through the outer layers, and wind demons shrieked in the sky, they waited.
As other men went to Everam in glory, they waited.
“No alagai sighted,” Shanjat relayed, signaling back to the nie’Sharum on the wall.
“None will be sighted!” Hasik growled, and there was a rumble of assent from Jardir’s men. Fifty of the best warriors of the Kaji crouched with them in the ambush pocket. Wasted.
“There is still time to find glory, if we join other units,” Jurim said.
Jardir knew he must kill the idea before it could take root in the minds of the others. He thrust his spear butt between Jurim’s eyes, knocking him to the ground.
“I will personally spear anyone who leaves their post without my orders,” he said loudly. The others nodded as Jurim struggled to his feet, clutching his bloodied face.
Jardir looked upon the men, the finest dal’Sharum the Desert Spear had to offer, and felt profound shame. The Sharum Ka’s jealousy was directed at him, but it was the men who suffered. Men bred and born to kill alagai, denied their destiny by an old man afraid of losing power. Not for the first time, Jardir envisioned killing the First Warrior, fair challenge or no, but such a crime would be without honor, and would likely cost his life as well as his legacy.
Just then a horn sounded, and Jardir snapped back to attention. The pattern told him it was a cry for assistance.
“Watchers!” he called, and the two Watchers from his unit, Amkaji and Coliv, sprang forward. They attached the ends of their twelve-foot, iron-shod ladders in an instant, running to the wall. No sooner had Amkaji set the ladder than Coliv was running up it, taking the rungs three at a time, his weight never seeming to fully come down on a foot before he was lifting it again. He reached the walltop in an instant, scanning the terrain. A moment later he signaled that it was safe for Jardir’s ascent.
Jardir had been wary of the Watchers when he first took command of his unit, for they were of another tribe, the Krevakh. But he had come to know their hearts, and Amkaji and Coliv were as loyal to him and as devoted to alagai’sharak as any of his own tribesmen. The Krevakh were wholly devoted to serving the Kaji, as their nemesis tribe, the Nanji, served the Majah.
By law, the two Watchers were embedded with Jardir’s unit day and night, for the Watchers had specialized training in exotic weapons and fighting styles, and had skills essential to any kai’Sharum. Acrobatics. Information gathering. Hit-and-run combat.
Assassination.
As Amkaji held the ladder, Jardir and Shanjat ran up the wall. Coliv held his far-seeing glass out to Jardir.
“Sharach tribe, fourth layer,” he supplied, pointing.
“Learn more,” Jardir ordered, taking the glass, and Coliv ran off, his balance perfect across the narrow wall. Watchers carried neither spear nor shield to weigh them, and Coliv was fast gone from sight.
“The Sharach are a small tribe,” Shanjat said. “They bring barely two
dozen warriors to alagai’sharak. Only a fool would put such a small unit in the fourth layer.”
“A fool like the Sharum Ka,” Jardir replied.
Coliv returned a moment later. “A cluster of alagai reached them, and avoided the pit. They have many warriors down, and no reinforcements close enough who are not engaged themselves. They will be overrun in minutes.”
Jardir gritted his teeth. “No, they will not. Ready the men.”
Shanjat laid a hand on his arm. “The Sharum Ka ordered us to guard the tenth,” he reminded him, but when Jardir nodded and did not say more, he broke into a wide smile.
“We will never get to the fourth layer in time, kai’Sharum,” Coliv said, scanning the Maze with his sharp eyes. “Many battles rage in between. The way is not clear.”
“Then lower ropes,” Jardir ordered. “I want every man on the wall now.”
They ran the walltops like nie’Sharum; fifty adult warriors in full battle dress. Treacherous enough for barefoot and agile boys in nothing but their bidos, it was far more so for men in sandals and heavy armored robes, carrying spear and shield.
But these were Kaji dal’Sharum, Jardir’s elite. They ran fearlessly, whooping with delight as they leapt from wall to wall, feeling like boys as the night wind whipped their faces, ready to die like men.
Jardir, running in the lead, felt it more than anyone. The Sharum Ka would be furious with him, but Nie take him before he let an entire tribe die out to appease the First Warrior’s pride.
A trip that would have taken many times as long in the Maze was accomplished in minutes atop the walls, and the Sharach unit quickly came into view. There were more than a dozen alagai in the ambush pocket, cutting off all avenues of escape. At least half the Sharach were down, and those who remained stood on the defensive, back-to-back and shield-to-shield as demons came at them from all sides.
They stood as men before an overwhelming force of alagai, and the sight enraged Jardir’s Krasian heart. He would let no more dal’Sharum die this night.
“Take heart, Sharach!” he cried. “The Kaji come to your aid!” He was the first to set his hook and throw a rope down into the pocket, rappelling the twenty feet in two quick hops. He didn’t even wait for his men, charging in with his warded shield leading, taking a sand demon in the back. The wards flared, and the demon was thrown away from the failing Sharach circle.
Jardir paid the stunned creature no further mind, moving on to the next demon with a thrust of his spear, driving it back with a series of precise strikes to the weakest parts of its armor. Behind him, he heard the roar of his fifty as they poured down the wall, and knew his back was secure.
“Everam watched your stand with pride, brother!” Jardir cried to the Sharach kai’Sharum, whose white veil was red with blood. “See to your wounded now! We will finish your glorious start and see that the Sharach fight another day!”
The third demon Jardir charged turned to face him and caught his spear in its jaws, splintering the wood. The impact threw Jardir off balance, and the creature hooked the edge of his shield on its talon. It flexed its corded arm, and the shield straps snapped. Jardir hit the ground hard, dodging aside as the creature came at him. For a moment, the demon had the advantage, but the Sharach kai’Sharum slammed into it from the side, knocking it away from him.
“The Sharach will fight to the last, my brother!” the kai’Sharum cried, but the sand demon struck back, its tail whipping under the warrior’s guard to knock him down. It tensed to spring for the kill.
Jardir glanced about. His warriors were all engaged, and there was no weapon in reach.
I was born to die on alagai talons, he reminded himself, and growled as he leapt to his feet, intercepting the sand demon in midair as it launched itself at the Sharach kai’Sharum.
The demon was stronger than him by far, but it fought on instinct, knowing nothing of the brutal art of sharusahk. Jardir caught its arm and pivoted, diverting the force of its attack and throwing it fifteen feet into the demon pit at the center of the ambush pocket. The alagai fell away with a howl, trapped until the sun rose to burn it from the world forever.
Another sand demon came at him, but Jardir punched it hard in the throat and kicked at the backs of its knees, grappling the creature and bearing it to the ground, twisting to avoid its teeth and claws while turning the thrashing alagai’s own force against it.
The demon’s gritty armor plates cut through his robes, slicing his skin, and his muscles screamed as they were stretched to their limits, but inch by inch, Jardir twisted farther behind the demon until he reached the desired hold and rose to his feet. He was taller than the creature, and with his arms locked under its pits and behind its head, he easily lifted it off the ground. It kicked and shrieked, but Jardir whipped it about, keeping its hind legs far from his body as he stumbled toward the demon pit.
With a shout, he threw the second demon into the pit, gratified to see that his warriors had already driven most of the other alagai into it as well. The pit floor was a seethe of scale and talon, the wards cut into the walls sparking angrily as they tried to climb out.
“I will watch as the sun takes you all!” Jardir shouted.
He turned back to the battle, flush with victory and ready to fight on, but only a few warriors still fought, and they had their alagai well in hand.
The rest of the men simply stared at him, eyes wide.
Jardir and the Sharach kai’Sharum stood watch over the pit for the rest of the night. Their men stood clustered about them, and there was a great cheer when the sunlight reached the pit. The demons shrieked and smoked before finally bursting into flame, and the men were proud to bear witness as Everam’s light burned them back into the nothingness from which they came.
Jardir and the other Sharum lowered their veils, as was proper in the sun. By day, the Sharach, beholden to the Majah, were blood enemies of the Kaji. Jardir eyed the kai’Sharum warily. It would dishonor them both to turn on each other in the neutral ground of the Maze, but such things were not unheard of.
Instead, the Sharach captain bowed. “My people owe you a blood debt.”
Jardir shook his head. “We did nothing that Everam did not command. No dal’Sharum would ever abandon a brother, and all men are brothers in the night.”
“I was there when the Sharum Ka sent you to the tenth, where we should have been,” the Sharach said. “You came far and dared much for us.”
Other warriors, their own pits burning, came across them as they left the Maze. Two blood enemies, standing together. A crowd began to form, and Jardir heard the buzz of their conversation. Again and again, he heard his men and the Sharach tell of how he had fought the alagai unarmed. The tale grew with each telling, and before long men were saying he had killed five demons with his bare hands. Jardir had seen warriors exaggerating deeds before. By nightfall, it would be a dozen he sent into the pit, and a month from now, fifty.
A Majah kai’Sharum approached them. “On behalf of the Majah,” he said, “I thank you for protecting the Sharach. The Sharum Ka was…unwise to put them in such danger.”
The man’s words were near treason, but Jardir only nodded. “The Sharach stood tall,” he said. “It was inevera that they live to fight again.”
“Inevera,” the Majah agreed, bowing lower than one kai’Sharum need bow to another. “Did you truly wrestle six demons into the pit yourself?”
Jardir shook his head and opened his mouth to reply, but he was cut off by a shout as the elite guard of the Sharum Ka stormed into view, clearing the way for the First Warrior.
“You disobeyed orders and left your post!” the Sharum Ka shouted, pointing at Jardir.
“The Sharach called for aid and we were unengaged,” Jardir said. “The Evejah tells us to protect our brothers in the night above all things.”
“Do not quote the sacred text to me,” the Sharum Ka snapped. “I was teaching it to my sons when your father was in his bido, and I know its truths far better than you! Ther
e is nothing that tells you to have your men scale the Maze walls and leave your layer unguarded while you protect one half the Maze away.”
“Unguarded!” Jardir goggled. “There were no demons in the eighth, much less the tenth!”
“It is not your place to disregard orders and seek glory that is not yours, kai’Sharum!” the Sharum Ka shouted.
Jardir’s temper flared. “Perhaps my orders would have been less foolish if the one giving them did not hide in his palace until dawn,” he said, knowing even as he did that he might as well have pulled his spear. Such an insult to the First Warrior could not be allowed to pass. If he were any kind of man, he would grab a spear and attack Jardir now, killing him before all the assembled men.
But the Sharum Ka was old, and men whispered of how Jardir had killed half a dozen demons with sharusahk alone. Jardir could not attack the First Warrior himself, but if the Sharum Ka attacked him, Jardir would be free to kill him and open a succession that might well put him in the Sharum Ka’s palace. He wondered if this was the fate Inevera’s bones had foretold so many years before.
They locked stares, and Jardir knew the Sharum Ka was thinking the same things he was, and did not have the courage to attack. He sneered.
“Arrest him!” the Sharum Ka commanded. Immediately his guards moved to comply.
Jardir’s hands were bound, a grave dishonor, but though he bared his teeth at the guards, he did not resist. There was a rumble of discontent from the assembled warriors, even the Majah. They gripped spears and lifted shields, greatly outnumbering the First Warrior’s guards.
“What are you doing?” the Sharum Ka demanded of the crowd. “Stand down!”
But the rumbling only grew, and men moved to block the exits from the Maze. The Sharum Ka took a tentative step back. Jardir met his eyes, and smiled.
“Do nothing,” Jardir said loudly, without taking his eyes from the Sharum Ka. “The Sharum Ka has given a command, and all Sharum are bound to comply. Everam will decide my fate.”
The grumbling quieted immediately, men clearing the path, and the Sharum Ka’s rage seemed doubled at Jardir’s control of the men. Jardir sneered at him again, daring him to attack.
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